Ticket dispute 17 months later
 

I finally received a court date for a ticket i received in late 2007. Isn't there something about a right to a quick and speedy court hearing process for disputes?

If the courts weren't backlogged with people disputing tickets just because they were hoping that the cop wouldn't show up or hoping to get off on some sort technicality, you'd probably have had a court date already. However, as has been seen on this forum, there are plenty of people out there that dispute because portions of the grey box aren't filled in [correctly], or dispute and don't show up, etc etc etc and as such the courts are backlogged about an average of 12-18 months. Because of this backlog, your 17 month wait will not be considered an "unreasonable delay". Sorry.

http://img112.imageshack.us/img112/3903/lmao2od9.jpg

lol ok, now that i'm done laughing, let me ask you what your ticket is for?

does it all depend on the officer availability?

it took 30 months to get my court date

To Sho_BC, every person has the right to face their accuser. We live in a democradic society that allows everyone to dispute any charge that is against them. To say that there is a backlog in the system due to the number of people disputing tickets, I have news for you.

Cases are scheduled around the officer. If you go to court, look on the list and see how many other cases that officer is there for.

Ok, so what is the news? The reason that there is such a long wait for traffic court, is that there are so many people disputing their tickets. Direct correlation. At no point did I say that people didn't have a right to defend themselves. It is just my personal opinion that when people agree that they did what they're charged with doing, but try to get off on a technicality are trying to cheat a system that was made for people with legitimate claims of non-guilt. I believe that owning up to your errors/mistakes builds stronger character and better people.

And here is some news for you: We send the tickets to be processed, and never see them again unless someone disputes their ticket. When tickets are disputed, all we get is a stack (or singular) of tickets we wrote with a court date attached to it/them. The court date can be on a day when we're working, or it can fall on a day when we're not working.

At the same time, there is also the correlation that the system is wayyyyy understaffed especially when you consider that the Burnaby court house was closed and all Burnaby tickets go to the Vancouver traffic court.
I never said you were against people disputing their tickets, but it is their right. That is how the system works. Hate the game, not the player.
I can go out and murder someone and have my day in court. If I get off on a technicallity, well it isn't the first time that it has happened in our court system, and won't be the last. Owning up to errors and mistakes is what you believe, but there are plenty of people who do not view life the way you do.



Yes, but court dates are also scheduled in blocks. Whether you are scheduled to work or not, that is irrelevent. The people who schedule the court dates have no idea whether the office is scheduled to work or not. But cases are still scheduled in blocks to make it easier for the officer to attend.

IIRC, even if the officer is not scheduled to work that day, and does attend court for those tickets, I believe they are paid something called overtime.

Sure they have that right... doesn't mean it's a good idea for them to abuse it just because they don't feel like owning up to their own mistakes.

The system that lists the availability of the Police is called "Justin". You enter your available days and block out things like courses, leave, other things like specialized Unit training etc. They then inform you (supposedly) in advance enough so thast you can be there. The Traffic Tickets are all scheduled in one office and they have a backup that varies between 2 court dates to 2 years, depending on the backed up number of cases and load of incoming new ones. One of the ones I used to work out of had a 1 1/2 court date backup.

Part of the problem to the physical processing of the tickets is that some people wait literally years after the offense date, to contest their tickets. The Court is supposed to ONLY allow disputes within the legal 30 day time limit, but seem to ignore this on a regular basis. I have seen tickets on Vancouver island be set first time for a Court date 22 months after the offense date. They should have been refused by the Court, but were not, for ewhatever reason.

On an average court date at least 70% of my disputants never showed, the rest either wanted an adjournment, had someone else appear fior them, or requested a fine reduction. I had many dates with 20-26 disputes and only went to trial on 2 or 3. This is another reason for the delay. The Govt. is looking at a couple of areas to reduce the waiting periods but I don't know how far they got with them?.

I believe it used to be 2 years to get a disputed ticket invalidated due to unreasonable delay, however due to the increase in driving population and therefore increased tickets and disputes, I'm not sure the courts will still invalidate a ticket that is over 2 years old, the time might be further extended..

Although I highly doubt this is the case, if new evidence or discoveries appear after the 30 day period, a court secertary might be obliged to give you the opportunity to dispute the ticket. Also, if for whatever reason, the courts do not receive the ticket dispute request within the 30 days, (as in, I sent the dispute, but the courts didn't get it) then there is a provision for them to still dispute the ticket. (You don't HAVE to go thru the supreme court, although that is the ultimate option)

This happened to me 5+ years ago. I sent in a disputed ticket, but 6 months later, I didn't get a court date. I called the courts and they said there was no ticket in the system for dispute. 9 months later I got a letter from ICBC saying I owe money. It was nearly 20 months before I got to court to dispute it. (BTW, I won.)

My experience ( and yours may differ) when the local courthouses handles the dispute schedules was that this was generally NOT the case. What normally happened was that somebody "forgot" about the ticket and then could not renew their DL or regsitration...so then they chose to dispute the ticket. Others did this on purpose in an attempt to have the issuing officer not there because of transfer, holidays etc. I know this for a fact as the courthouse staff would tell me. I also spoke with some of the disputants or their associates themselves. The advantage of working in smaller communities.

Also, I've had a ticket charge dropped by the crown because the detachment LOST THE TICKET. Police detachments and courthouses are run by humans who are prone to mistakes just like the rest of us, so it does happen every once in a while, that ticket disputes are lost or whatever.

Since it's your money on the line, it's up to you to follow up with the courts/police to see what is going on with your ticket. That's the best advice I can give anyways.